1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the encapsulation of contaminant particles on the surface of a component, such as a disk drive component. More particularly, the present invention relates to the isolation of particulate contamination by using an organic coating to encapsulate the particles.
2. Description of Related Art
Many components that are assembled into devices include particulate contamination on the surface of the component as a result of the manufacturing process. Often, this particulate contamination is composed of the same material as the component. For example, metallic components that are manufactured using various milling and/or cutting steps often contain particles of the metal on the component surface as a result of the manufacturing process.
Washing the components in a liquid washing operation can easily remove many of the larger particles from the component surface. Depending upon the nature of the component and other variables, washing operations are generally effective for removing particles having a size of greater than about 1 μm. Such particles can also be removed using chemical or electrochemical etching processes. For the fabrication of many devices, the removal of these larger particles is sufficient for assembly and proper operation of the device.
However, many devices are susceptible to damage as a result of smaller particles becoming loose and moving within the device. For example, disk drives adapted to store large amounts of data in a computerized system include one or more magnetic storage disks having a magnetic recording layer and a read/write head for writing and reading data to and from the recording layer. During operation, the read/write head floats in close proximity above the surface of the disk, often within 20 nanometers or less of the disk surface. As a result, the presence of very small particles on the disk surface can lead to read/write errors and the disk drive may be unusable.
The disk drive includes many other components in addition to the magnetic storage disk and the read/write head. The introduction of particulate contamination into the disk drive by these components can therefore render the disk drive unusable. Therefore, the particles should be removed prior to assembly of the device. As stated above the components can be washed in one or more washing steps, however, such washing steps are not able to remove very small particles, such as those having a size of less than 0.5 μm.
The particles can also be strongly adhered to the component so that the particles are immobilized and cannot move within the device. For example, there have been attempts to plate components with electroless nickel to immobilize the particles. However, the metal plating is relatively thick and can affect the physical dimensions of the component, rendering them unsuitable for the device.
There is a need for an improved method for immobilizing particulate contamination in such devices.